Date: Sat, 26 Jul 2008 12:57:57 -0500
From: George Gauthier
Subject: Naked Prey
Naked Prey
by GGDC
Author's Note: This is a tale of a young man and those he encounters in
French Equatorial Africa in the late 19th century. It contains graphic
descriptions of the male human body and of consensual sexual activity
between adult males.
If any of this would offend a reader, read no further. This is not intended
for persons younger than an age where they may freely and legally select
their reading matter in whatever jurisdiction applies.
It is offered for entertainment. It is as historically accurate in its
setting as I could make it, with only minor poetic license. If it manages
to both intrigue and to provoke prurient interest, it will have succeeded
in its aim.
It is entirely fictional, with no resemblance intended to any person living
or dead.
This is my first story so far for the Historical section of the Nifty
Archive that is not part of my 'Daphne Boy' series.
Readers who like these stories might want to try my 'Jungle Boy' series of
tales in a modern setting, posted in the Gay/Authoritarian section of the
archive. Sharp eyed readers may detect the origins of this story in the
fictional movie featured in the first of my Jungle Boy stories. Also,
please try my 'Daphne Boy' stories in the Historical section and my
futuristic "Track and Field" stories in SF/Fantasy.
Comments and feedback welcome.
Chapter 1. French Equatorial Africa
Too bad they couldn't hang a mosquito net around the outhouse for those
night-time visits that biology sometimes required. Jean slipped off his cot
and closed the mosquito net behind him then set off, bare feet slapping on
the raised walkway to the facility. The flooring was raised only half a
meter, but it kept his feet out of the muddy earth and lessened the chance
of a barefoot encounter with a snake. Good thing there was a strong breeze
tonight to keep the bloodsuckers off him, though they usually bothered him
much less than folk with darker hair; his was blond. Moonlight shone on his
bare skin. In the brutal tropical heat of French Equatorial Africa, Jean
always slept naked.
He quickly did his business and had started back to his rooms when a rain
shower started. This was fine by him. He pull one of the cane chairs out
onto the open deck, sat down, and let the shower wash all over him. It felt
good on his bare skin. He bathed daily, as much to prevent tropical skin
diseases as for comfort and cleanliness, but it didn't take long to acquire
a sheen of sweat in this heat, even lying still. Gods know why the French
Republic wanted an official presence in these forsaken lands which brought
no obvious economic benefits to France. Showing the flag really. In the
scramble for Africa in the last two decades of the nineteenth century, the
district of Ubanghi was a part of the continent that had fallen into the
hands of the French, sandwiched between German and Belgian holdings.
At least his superior in the Colonial Office, M. Malherbe, wasn't around to
see him at this late hour and complain yet again about his casual attitude
to clothing off duty. Here he was sitting totally naked where he might be
seen from the servants moving about, up early to get things ready.
"The white man must set the example for the natives, M. Thibault. They are
like children." Malherbe always said. "Proper attire is necessary for us to
maintain our position, to show the superiority of French civilization, to
promote our civilizing mission. What would your grandfather say?"
Jean did not view the natives as children at all but as men and women, and
he thought they set a fine example of minimal clothing, just a loincloth
for men in the tropical heat, though there was something to be said for
stout boots as footwear. Too bad he could not emulate them. Malherbe barely
tolerated the sarongs Jean wore off duty, brought back from his first
truncated posting in French Polynesia. Jean also thought that his
grandfather Thibault, an old soldier, would attribute the superiority of
French civilization to the machine gun and the breech-loading rifle.
Malherbe visited this remote district sub-office only once a month, staying
a couple of days. Jean liked it that way. If he had to endure exile from
his beloved Paris, at least he didn't have to put up with boors like his
boss for company every day. It did make for isolation. Jean was the only
white man thereabouts except for an occasional patrol by the military.
Malherbe had his own reservations about his young subordinate. Malherbe
suspected some scandal had cut the young man's tour of duty on Tahiti short
after less than a year. Whatever it was his contacts had failed to unearth
any details.
Actually, Jean, then only eighteen and just out of the lycˇe, was found
in bed one night with four native Tahitians his own age, in lusty sexual
congress. He was caught in flagrante delicto with a boy plugging each
orifice. The other two admitted they were just waiting their turn at him
too. It was a twice weekly arrangement where this scion of the French
aristocracy surrendered himself to randy native boys to be used as their
sexual plaything. Jean had no difficulty finding partners. He had taken to
swimming naked in the lagoon and had caught the eye of many of the young
men of the islands.
Jean did not share the racial prejudices of his time. He though the
Polynesians were fine looking folk. The men were handsome (and the women
pretty, if that was where your interests lay). Tahitians were not sexually
inhibited the way white men so often were, Sex was deemed entirely natural,
even between young males. Jean was very much a bottom boy and very much in
demand. One time they had held an orgy where more than a dozen boys or
young men had enjoyed Jean's charms.
The Prefect hustled Jean out on the very next boat. For his family's sake
they hushed it up. The family was old and rich and influential, and the old
General, a notable duelist, would likely challenge anyone who cast
aspersions on his only grandson.
It was the general, not Clemenceau, himself a well-known duelist, about
whom the famous quip was first told. The young officer serving as then
Colonel Thibault's aide and second for the duel noticed that his superior
had bought only a one-way ticket for the trip on the suburban railway to
the dueling ground.
"Sir, aren't you being rather pessimistic?" the young man asked
reproachfully.
"Not at all," the older man assured him, adding confidently: "I always use
my opponent's ticket for the return trip."
Actually for all his fierce reputation, the General would not have called a
man out over his grandson's preference for his own gender. Killing a man
for speaking the truth, whatever his motivaion, would be
dishonorable. Deplorable as it was and disappointing to the continuity of
the family line, it was only the truth, as Jean had admitted to him in a
heart to heart talk.
Jean was the apple of his eye, a comely youth with a lively intelligent
face. True, he lacked his father's military bearing. He took after his
mother, bless her, as fine a daughter-in-law as any man could have wished
for. Jean was rather a pretty boy: short and slightly built with longish
blond hair, green eyes, and delicate features. He had an almost elfin
quality about him but was not at all effeminate. He was always an active
lad running around the estate, swimming, climbing the fells and cliffs of
their corner of the Massif Central. He liked to compete in foot races with
the other boys and usually won. At the general's suggestion, he had taken
up the arts of savatte and boxing and knew how to wield a stave and the
more elegant walking stick in self-defense as well as shoot both pistol and
rifle. Although an avid reader and insatiably curious, the boy was no pasty
faced bookworm but usually bronzed from the summer sun.
The General had hoped that keeping Jean away from the temptations of Paris
would give the boy a chance to come to his senses. Yes the general could
understand his feelings. As a young man, he himself had taken a a male
lover, but discreetly. He later had married a good woman and been a kind
and caring spouse. His wife had accepted his very occasional dalliances
knowing her husband would not bring it home, would never impose on the
servants, and would certainly never take advantage of his official
position. Yes his aides were always handsome young men, but were chosen for
their competence and promise. Their physical beauty, while not
coincidental, was entirely decorative. There was never anything physical
with any of his subordinates. That too would have been dishonorable.
Jean was very sorry he had disappointed his grandfather. He was the father
figure he grew up with after the early death of his father from the cholera
in Morocco. The General had expected Jean would take another posting in
pleasant Algeria, virtually an extension of southern France. Instead Jean
had wound up in this pestilential hell-hole, deep in the interior. At least
he hadn't taken sick like so many whites in these regions. For all his
slight build, his wiry body had always been resistant to illnesses that
plagued others.
Since dawn was upon him, he decided to get some paperwork out of the way
before breakfast. Slipping a sarong around his narrow hips he walked to his
office and sat down at his desk. Two productive hours later, it was time to
start his daily routine. He wondered if he should shave today. He looked in
the mirror and saw only a very light fuzz near the jaw line -- you had to
get quite close to the mirror to see anything at all, so fine, you couldn't
call it stubble. It had been eleven days since a razor had touched those
cheeks. Nineteen years old and still a beardless boy. He also had almost no
body hair, just small tufts in his armpits and groin and an invisible
dusting on his lower legs.
As a preventive health measure Jean kept his groin and armpits shaved,
where, like his sparse beard, the hair there did not grow out very
fast. Three kinds of lice infest the human body. Shaving the groin thwarted
possible pubic lice, clean clothing and bedding thwarted body lice. Jean's
frequent nudity and light clothing helped there too. And he was always
careful about head to head contact and keeping his headgear separate for
fear of head lice. He suspected Malherebe carried two or even all three
kinds. So much for the superiority of French civilization.
After breakfast Jean showered and dressed properly in tropical whites and
boots but without the string necktie. He received visitors and petitioners
with much the usual complaints: the road was washed out here; a rogue
elephant were rampaging among the fields there, bandits had struck in the
south, slavers in the east. Some problems he handled with a telegram to
Malherbe or to the military garrison at Fort Dinard. He himself would take
care of the rogue elephant. It was a good excuse for a short safari anyway,
a few days away from the office. On the way back he could check out the
extent of the damage to the roadway before mobilizing a crew to fix it.
In the afternoon he set out on the hunt. He did not bother with a
horse. That was for riding along the military roads, really dirt tracks,
that criss crossed the country linking French outposts. This part of Africa
was not plagued by the tsetse fly that doomed European livestock and often
white men too. For this trip into the jungle, he would be on footpaths or
forcing his way through the tangle, chopping a path with a machete. He set
off with a small party, a couple of bearers and his major domo and
interpreter, Maloto.
He had a good rifle with him to handle the elephant or any of the big
cats. He also took along a pistol, a telescope, and a map, such as it
was. Cartographers had their work cut out for them in the wastes of central
Africa with the limitations of late nineteenth century technology. Maloto
was similarly armed. He was a native constable in addition to his other
duties. Jean made sure he was paid twice, once for his job a major domo,
and again as a constable and interpreter. That had led to an argument early
on with Malherbe. In the end, Jean agreed to pay Maloto's salary as major
domo out of his own pocket. The man was invaluable for his local knowledge
of the people and the land, and he had a fine sense of humor to liven the
long hours they spent together. A widower with grown children, he could
devote his full time to his duties.
Jean did not disdain to carry some of his own supplies, though in a back
pack, not on top of his head like the bearers did. That was supposed to be
easier, with the skeleton rather than the muscles bearing the load, but he
knew it would look ridiculous, even if he got the hang of it. He carried
his rifle. His grandfather had spoken scornfully of white hunters in Africa
who were too lazy to carry their own rifles. A soldier never lets his
weapon get out of his hands while on the march.
Chapter 2. Encounters
"What do you think, Maloto? Is all the damage to these fields the work of a
rogue or just a hungry and opportunistic elephant?"
"Definitely, a rogue, sir, from all the unnecessary damage. Also the way he
attacked the man and boy who tried to scare him off banging pots and
pans. A normal elephant would not have trampled them."
>From the prints Jean could tell it was of good size, but forest elephants
are smaller than the great bush elephant of the open savannah. With any
luck, he could bring him down with a single shot. Jean and Maloto followed
the tracks to a dust wallow where they found the rogue. The beast caught
the white man's distinctive scent at the last moment when the wind shifted,
but Jean got him in the head with his first shot.
You really don't want to have to rely on a second. Elephants can move fast,
charging in a kind of shuffle. An elephant is too heavy to get all four
feet off the ground at once, in a gallop, as a horse does. Never try to
outrun one though. Same thing for the comical looking but aggressive and
dangerous hippos, if you encountered them on land. Jean took comfort in the
knowledge that Maloto was a fair shot and would have backed him up, if his
first shot had not done the trick. Maloto assured Jean that a man could
outrun a crocodile, but Jean hoped he never had to prove it. Maybe that was
just Maloto's sense of humor talking.
Jean saw to it that the elephant's meat was distributed to the entire
village, with the ivory tusks going to the families of the two victims. The
natives appreciated his forbearance in not taking the valuable ivory for
himself, as was his right, and welcomed the swift end to the threat of the
murderous elephant.
The party them proceeded to where the roadway had washed out. It was more
like a small landslide. Jean would have to mobilize more men than he had
figured once he got back to the district office. At least they had enough
tools in storage for the work crew, and Jean could draw on discretionary
funds to pay the workers. Jean was scrupulous about paying wages, not just
raising an unpaid levy as some corrupt officials were known to do, to keep
the men's wages for themselves. He left word at the nearest village for the
men to assemble in four days' time when he would be back with tools and to
supervise the work. A colonial officer was necessarily a jack of all
trades: administrator, diplomat, conciliator, judge, constable, hunter,
engineer, and even doctor, though the local witch doctors were touchy about
their prerogatives.
Jean respected the natives as human beings, with the same hopes and desires
as anyone. However, as a son of the Enlightenment Jean did not see any
reason to respect their superstitious belief that when something bad
happened a malign witch must be responsible. Witch doctors were good at
singling out vulnerable old women to take the blame for illness, crop
failure, snake bite, storms, or any other misfortune, often inciting mobs
to kill the supposed malefactor.
"Nkobo says this landslide was caused by a witch." Maloto reported.
"More likely the heavy rains in the last week, Maloto. Tell him that for
me. Try to be diplomatic."
The witch doctor merely blamed the witch for the heavy rains. There was no
reasoning with the irrational. Jean wished these people well. He respected
how they had managed to wrest a living from this wretched land, but how
could they advance if they still held to primitive notions of how the world
worked? This was the nineteenth century after all, almost the
twentieth. Such views were out of date in the modern world.
He was candid enough to admit that native witch doctors in Africa were all
too similar to Christian witch hunters of Europe only a couple of centuries
earlier. Both were unscientific and magic based attempts to understand the
existence of good and evil, fortune and misfortune. Completely wrongheaded
of course, and charges of witchcraft were often opportunistic. Also, local
witch doctors were responsible for half the recent unrest among the
tribes. They even opposed visits by traveling doctors or preventive public
health measures like vaccinations and sanitary water supplies.
Nkobo was not mollified, glaring at the young white man. It did not help
that Jean was small and slight of build, much smaller than the average
native who was strongly built. Jean's blond hair, green eyes, and straight
nose emphasized their racial differences. Nkobo was a mature man. Jean was
only nineteen and looked younger and he was so very pretty, like a
girl. Nkobo almost sneered at the young Frenchman, dismissing his
naturalistic notions about misfortune and disease. No wonder. If they
gained wider currency, they would completely undermine his position.
That would be just as well, Jean thought. Pasteur and Koch had recently
proved the germ theory of disease. Now there was an exemplar of French
civilization: the great Louis Pasteur, dead only this year. French doctors
had originally rejected his theories because he was a chemist by training,
not a medical man. He and the German Koch invented the science of
microbiology, despite the nay saying of the medical establishment. In so
doing, they had showed up the medical community for practically a bunch of
quacks in their understanding of infectious disease. It was doctors who for
centuries had foisted the system of the four bodily humors on humanity,
doctors who persisted in completely ineffective herbal remedies, doctors
who insisted on aggressively treating every ailment, not recognizing that
many illnesses were self-limiting, ones people got over naturally, if left
alone.
It was doctors, after all, who had killed the great George Washington,
friend and father figure to Lafayette, one of Jean's heros and a man to
whom he was distantly related, bleeding him instead of just giving
supportive care till his own vitality threw off the flu or simple head cold
he had contracted. Only recently had orthodox medicine become truly
scientific. The lesson there was that irrationality was not limited by race
or culture or nation.
A couple of weeks later, back at the district station, Jean heard a clatter
from outside the compound. It was a patrol of French soldiers led by
Lieutenant Henri Duchamp, his only real friend in the region. Duchamp was
dark and wavy while Jean was fair and straight, but both were small in
build and pretty rather than handsome. Henri affected a narrow mustache
trying to look older and more seasoned, but he still looked like a very
young man of twenty-two.
"Welcome, Henri. Come, let me show your men to their new quarters."
Jean led the officer and his sergeant around the side of the compound where
Jean had erected twin platforms covered with thatch to shelter the men
during their stop overs. The platforms kept them off the damp ground,
protected them from snakes and scorpions, but had no walls except mosquito
netting. Jean was very proud of that. The men could lay their bedrolls out,
the open walls would let the evening breezes in, but the netting would keep
the mosquitos out. The thatched roof would keep the men out of the
rain. Another shelter protected an outdoor kitchen.
"Naturally, I hope you will still accept my personal hospitality, Henri."
Jean ventured, giving his friend a wink. They were lovers as well as
friends.
Jean was delighted to learn the soldiers would be staying for several days,
marching out in different directions to show the flag. The natives had been
restless of late. Rumors had spread that the French were about to repeat
the dastardly tactics of the Belgian king Leopold II in his personal
possession, the Congo Free State, a corporate state which he ran more like
a concentration camp than a colony. The Belgians forced the natives to
search for wild rubber, neglecting their own fields and families. Those who
fell short of the quota got a hand lopped off. The rapacious monarch
earned infamy due to the brutal mistreatment of native peoples and plunder
of natural resources. (The Belgian state was finally forced by
international outcry to take over the colony in 1908.)
Over dinner Jean and Henri discussed their recent adventures and talked
idly of what they would do once they were free to return to
Paris. Meanwhile, they had each other. Both young men were randy boys who
enjoyed lusty sexual congress. They made a fun couple. Though there was
nothing serious between them, they really liked each other as friends and
were very good in bed together. Fortunately Jean had long since replaced
his original cot with a solidly built bed, big enough for two. Often the
boys sixty-nined, both of them liking the taste of a boy's cum or just
having it splooge on their face. That made them feel very sexy and
desired. They French kissed, tongues dueling and probing deep.
Sometimes Jean straddled Henri's hips, slowly sinking down on his rigid
cock, impaling himself on the older boy's member, sighing as he sank all
the way down and his butt cheeks touched Henri's bare groin. Like Jean,
Henri was hairless at the fork of his legs and virtually everywhere
else. Henri traced his fingers down the small veins, just under the skin,
in Jean's hairless belly. He fingered the chevrons of the blond boy's
ribs. His thumbs circled Jean's tiny red nipples then rubbed the sharp
hipbones he had come to know so well. He admired the corrugations of Jeans
abdominals. Jean had so little body fat, it was easy to see the tracery of
veins or the movements of tendons and muscles in the forearms. For one so
slender, Jean was well muscled, much like Henri himself. Indeed Henri was
only four centimeters taller with nearly the identical build.
Henri also liked to put Jean on his back, to throw Jean's slender legs over
his shoulders, to bend the younger boy in half, pushing him up and over
till his knees were by his face and he was scrolled up utterly
vulnerable. Then he drilled into the blond boy, squelching and thrusting
into his fundament. Jean would toss his head from side to side in helpless
arousal as Henri filled his ass with his formidable cock.
"This is what you need 'blondinet' (little blondie), a real man to show you
what you were born for, to put you on your back with your heels in the air
or on your knees worshiping his manhood. Your tiny nipples were made for
chewing on or for pinching as you submit to a man's cock."
"Yes, Henri, fuck me, fuck me hard. You are right, I need it. I want it. I
can't get enough cock or enough of you."
He said it so passionately you would not realized some of it was play
acting till he added in an off-hand tone.
"Just remember, mon ami. Tomorrow night, I get to play the aggressor."
That earned him a playful slap on his rump from his lover for his
effrontery. Soon after their lovemaking ended, rain started to fall. They
stepped out onto the deck and let it wash over them, limbs still
intertwined, kissing and nibbling ears or stroking backs and asses. Then
they turned their faces upwards, opening themselves totally to nature's
cleansing and cooling rains, reveling in life, in their sexuality, in their
closeness, and in their joy in having found each other practically at
world's end. It felt so sexy to be there in the rain. The way it washed so
totally over them, touching them everywhere made them feel utterly
naked. The rain drummed on their chests. The waters flowed down their sides
and their bellies, dividing around the prow of their proud cocks, sluicing
down their cleavages.
After a while they lay down on the deck side by side, ribs and hips and
legs touching. The deck had just enough give so it was not too
uncomfortable. The boys held hands, looked up at the clouds, blinked away
the raindrops that fell onto their faces and plastered the hair to their
heads. Just two naughty boys without the sense to come in out of the rain,
and they loved it. They giggled as they reminisced about the
boyhoods. Something about being naked and rained upon under the open sky
made them cast aside their last reserve as they spoke candidly of their
hopes and desires for the future, a future they hoped they could share in
some way. Henri expected to marry eventually, if only to continue the
family line. Jean reached out and placed his hand protectively over his
lover's genitals. Perish the day when these organs were not devoted to
their mutual pleasure.
After a while, Henri raised up on one elbow and leaned over and kissed
Jean. They resumed their lovemaking though this time at a slow tempered
pace. Jean flipped on his belly as Henri gripped his buttocks and entered
him carefully, seeking his joy spot. Their hearts soared in the age old
dance of physical love between two males, carrying their passions to their
natural consummation. Then still locked together, they rolled over on their
sides and let the rain wash over their conjoined bodies. Neither had ever
felt so much at one with the natural world and with each other. It was a
sublime moment. In their exhaustion they actually fell asleep for an
hour. Then they got up and sank together onto Jean's comfortable bed.
The next day, their joint shower was but a pale imitation of their
consummation in the rain, but still naughty and fun. Alas, duty called so
their time together was brief. At least they had three more nights
together. Both boys hoped for more rain. What a sensual experience they had
shared!
Chapter 3. Restless Natives
Orders came from Fort Dinard by telegraph for Henri to march his men east
to meet the main column on the Ubangi River. Given the respective
distances, his patrol would not have to depart till the next day. Henri set
his soldiers to readying their equipment, fixing boots, cleaning their
rifles and sharpening their bayonets under the supervision of his two
sergeants. Jean proposed an excursion to Henri in the meantime. It would be
just the two of them. They rode their horses up a trail then led them by
the reins as they picked their way on foot to a small meadow in the middle
of the jungle. A low escarpment loomed overhead. Leaving their horses, Jean
and Henri made the climb, to find a lovely pool of water fed by a spring.
"You see Henri. With these steep slopes, we can be sure there are no crocs
in this pool. Let's go swimming. I come here often."
Stripping off, he plunged into the pool. Jean loved to swim and here he
could do it in perfect safety. Henri soon joined him. He was an adequate
swimmer though nothing like Jean. After a while Henri hiked his butt on a
rock and watched Jean stroke back and forth. The younger boy was like a
seal, completely at home in the water. Henri leaned back on his elbows and
turned his face up to the sun, eyes closed so he did not see Jean's
stealthy approach. Suddenly Jean's face was at the fork of Henri's legs,
playfully mouthing his friend's limp member. That soon changed as both boys
became aroused.
Jean closed his lips around the lovely, hard cock and sucked, moving his
head up and down, taking his lover's manhood entirely into his mouth and
throat as his lips kissed Henri's groin. Jean was a talented cock sucker
and had only a little trouble with Henri's considerable endowment. His
hands cupped Henri's buttocks as if to pull him even deeper into his
throat. His technique drew approving moans from Henri, as his penis
vanished into a velvet warmth that was his friend's mouth. Then Jean
withdrew to play with his tongue at his lover's cockhead, licking away the
drops of clear fluid welling out of the tiny slit at the end. Jean gently
grazed it with his teeth, tugging on the glans with soft sucks. Henri
spread his legs apart and squirmed, tossing his head. When the hard member
was coated and slick Henri suddenly put his hand on Jean's forehead and
said to him huskily.
"Get out of the water and on all fours. I am going to fuck you."
Jean complied, spreading his legs, looking back, his face flushed with
ardor, as Henri ran his cock head up and down his cleavage then poked at
Jean's hole which was already twitching with excitement. Henri's fingered
the hole for a bit, getting it ready to accept his girth, then put the head
of his cock to Jean's hole. This felt so right to both of them. Just a
little push to get past the first sphincter eliciting a little gasp from
the smaller boy. Henri pushed forward, slipping into him little by little,
leaning forward, his arms supporting his weight.
He was always surprised that this tiny orifice with its crinkly folds,
could accept his rather impressive girth, but it did, letting him slip in
up to the hilt. Their balls smacked together. When he was a deep as he
could go, Henri was rewarded with a blissful sigh from his partner. Henri
gave Jean time to get used to him, then started to pump slowly in and
out. He bent down to kiss the back of Jean's neck then nipped the flesh of
his shoulder.
Jean kept asking for more cock, for Henri to plant it deeper into him, to
thrust harder, to fill him with cock. They fell into a rhythm, Jean raising
his rump to meet the descending shaft as it penetrated his ass, using his
internal muscles to squeeze the invading penis, both boys sweating
profusely. They climaxed together, Jean felt his seed spurt on his belly
and on the ground matched by the wet warmth filling his innermost being.
"Mon Dieu", he uttered, satisfaction in his voice. "It gets better every
time!"
The lay down for a while, recouping their energy. After a while it was
Jean's turn, though this time he and Henri made love face to face, kissing
and playing with each other's nipples. Jean had tiny red nipples. Henri's
were large and brown, like a woman's Jean always kidded him. They were
young and in love so it did not take long for their bodies to reach a
second climax that morning. The two young men sighed and lay together
contentedly.
What a wonderful chance for the two of them to cast aside the cares of
office and just enjoy each other, to enjoy their youth and vitality, to
have time to themselves, together, naked, under the sky, basking in the
sunlight, watching birds flit along the edge of the forest, listening to
monkeys chatter and scold in the background. They had brought bread and
cheese and wine and cold meats. With their backs against a large rock, the
two youthful males partook of a simple meal.
"Life is good, Henri. At least when I can share it with you."
"Yes, my friend. These months together have been magical. Let us hope for
more of the same in the future."
The boys kissed then stretched out on the grass, happy to be together, to
be naked and alone in each other's company. What a happy time for both of
them. Jean asked if Henri knew what the military maneuvers meant, but the
lieutenant was just as much in the dark as his friend in the colonial
office. He did know that the natives were restless. They both hoped
bloodshed could be avoided. An actual uprising would be a disaster,
useless really. No matter what they did, not matter what their initial
success, the natives could not stand against modern arms.
Look at the Zulus in British South Africa. They got lucky at Isandlwana in
1879 when an eclipse of the sun let the spear carrying warriors close
unseen with the British and their native levies. The Zulus slaughtered an
entire column, 1200 men, but ultimately lost the war despite their courage
and ferocity. How had that rhyming writer put it?
Whatever happens, we have got,
The Maxim gun, and they have not.
Suddenly as the boys were kissing and stroking each other, spear carrying
warriors emerged from the woods. The white men were cut off from their
weapons and clothing and quickly subdued, their wrists tied behind their
backs, a noose put around their necks to serve as a lead. The young men
were led stark naked from their trysting place back to the district
office. The natives purposely dragged them through thorn bushes or
thistles. Soon they were bleeding from dozens of minor cuts and pricks,
footsore, and very frightened.
Lt. Duchamp's command had been wiped out in a surprise attack aided by
poison slipped into their food. Only the residence still stood. The other
buildings had been burnt down. Jean's major domo Maloto was still alive,
beaten up, and, like them, in bondage. Warriors had broken into the liquor
stores, and many were drunk. One of the leaders of the uprising was the
witch doctor Nkobo. He spoke through Maloto, having him translate his
words.
"This is the beginning of the end for your tyranny over our people. Soon
all Africa will rise up to throw out the white man."
"What tyranny?" Jean countered. "We brought peace between the tribes, law
and order, and the benefits of civilization. We fought the slave trade."
"Silence, white dogs! Do you think we haven't been watching, you and your
disgusting couplings. This is what you have brought to Africa: your
unnatural lusts for other males. For this alone you shall die."
"If I weren't tied up..." Henri began.
"Then we shall untie you Lieutenant. Let us see how well you do against one
of our warriors. If you survive, we may let you live. Both of you."
They formed a ring and gave Henri a spear. He held the unfamiliar weapon
uncertainly. Jean nodded to him encouragingly. Now Henri had trained with
rifle, pistol, and saber, and he did not lack in courage, but this was new
to him, its weight quite unlike a bayonet on the end of a rifle. An officer
did not use a rifle much anyway, and the bayonet was nearly obsolete in the
days of breechloaders. It did give a soldier close-in protection in
colonial warfare if faced by a foe before he could reload.
A giant warrior confronted the naked Frenchmen, and their duel began. It
was more like an execution. Henri had little chance against the man's
greater strength and reach and his familiarity with the spear. Spear
fighting features nimble footwork. The smaller man was actually more agile,
but he could not take advantage of it. The style of fighting he had learned
for the bayonet was to plant the back foot and step forward with your
weight behind your thrust.
The warrior prolonged the combat, stabbing and cutting but not going for a
mortal blow till Henri got a couple of cuts at him which bled him and made
him angry. He fought more carefully, blocking every thrust the Frenchman
made. Soon both boys had tears in their eyes, Henri from frustration, Jean
from witnessing the slow murder of his lover. Finally when Nkobo decided he
had impressed his warriors enough, he called out and the giant combatant
drove his blade into Henri's belly. Henri fell mortally wounded.
During the combat another contingent of warriors had arrived and had
witnessed the finale. Jean ran to Henri's side. He could not take his
soldier lover into his arms, because they were bound. As Henri died, Jean
knelt next to him and sobbed for his loss. This beautiful young man was now
so much dead meat. Nkobo smiled at this. He shouted a command for Jean to
be killed too, but the chief of the new contingent countermanded the order.
This chief was named Kalundi. He recognized Jean as the man who had slain
the rogue elephant and had given the ivory to the families of the
dead. Jean was an official who had never cheated workers like his
predecessor, and had recently help recover villagers seized as slaves. Jean
had guessed where the slavers would go next and telegraphed for soldiers to
intercept them and return them to their village. Kalundi insisted that in
simple justice Jean deserved a chance to live. They owed him that much even
though they were at war and he and the young French officer just slain were
enemies.
After some arguing back and forth, Nkobo saw it would be to his advantage
to yield on this point. A reputation for magnanimity, feigned though it
might be, would strengthen his political power. He agreed to the ritual of
the Run of the Spears and signaled for warriors to cut Jean's bonds.
Five spearman from Kalundi's contingent threw their spears as far as they
could, the second standing where the first spear had fallen, then the third
where the second spear had fallen, and so forth. Maloto explained that this
was the head start they would give Jean. He must run for his life for the
warriors would surely slay him. Five warriors were singled out for the
pursuit from Nkobo's men. If they were successful, they would bring back
Jean's head as proof. The big warrior who had slain Henri insisted on
leading them. Kalundi laughed at the thought that the lumbering giant could
catch a nimble boy like Jean, but the man shook his head and retorted that
the other warriors would run the young white man down. He wanted to be in
on the kill.
Kalundi rather hoped Jean would get away, though he did not give much for
his chances. He had done what he could. His men had thrown their spears as
far as possible to give the white boy a decent head start. Still, the young
white man was small and with a shorter stride than the warriors. He was
unaccustomedly barefoot whereas the black warriors were used to going
unshod. Even so it was a chance. He gave Jean a water bottle and let him
drink his fill. Nkobo glared at this favoritism but said nothing. Jean
nodded his gratitude.
"I hope you get as much head start, Maloto." he told his assistant.
"I am afraid all I will get is a spear in the heart. Good luck, my friend."
As Jean stepped to the starting line, the giant warrior finished Maloto
off. Jean glanced at the bodies of his friend and his lover then trotted to
the far end of the line of spears, then took off running for all he was
worth.
Chapter 4. Run of the Spears
Jean ignored the unaccustomed wear and tear on his bare feet as he ran from
the compound. He heard a shout behind him that told him the warriors had
set out after him. At first he stayed on the military road as it was easier
on his feet, but he knew he had to leave it soon. He could not hope to
simply outdistance his pursuers, even if he were actually faster than any
single runner of theirs.
The warriors would use a well proven strategy to run the white man down,
same as wolves used. All but one of the group backs off the pace while a
single warrior bounds forward at full speed. This forces Jean to run faster
too. The warrior cannot maintain such a pace indefinitely, but neither can
the white man fleeing before him. After a while the warrior drops back,
letting another warrior force the pace. The first warrior lets the others
pass him. He will catch up as best he can after getting his wind back. Jean
meanwhile has to maintain this killer pace full time. Eventually he must
drop from exhaustion.
This is a winning strategy with only one flaw. When a front runner closes
on his prey, he is thereby far from his comrades. Jean might be able to
overcome him in a one-to-one fight. Of course Jean is unarmed while the
warrior has both spear and knife. Alternatively Jean might shake his
pursuers long enough to hide briefly, change direction, maybe even double
back. He had started off running eastward, toward Belgian territory and
where the French military were concentrating their forces. Fort Dinard lay
to the north. Those were the directions they would expect him to
run. Somehow, he had to shake them long enough to run west to German
territory in Kamerun. It had been more than twenty years since the Franco
Prussian War and it would be another twenty before hostilities resumed in
the First World War. He could expect the Germans to help a fellow European.
A canebrake was his first opportunity. It was a long stretch of bamboo
which Jean knew from previous hunts had no real game trails through it. He
darted off the road and into the bamboo, his small lithe body slipping
easily between the stalks. Although it was slower going than an all out
run, he could make better time through it than the large boned warriors who
were chasing him, especially the giant. Also, he managed to catch his
breath a bit. The bamboo stretched nearly a kilometer the long way but only
two hundred meters across, so he was soon out of it and into more open
country. That is when he poured it on, trying to put some real distance
between them, distance that would give him options.
Although his position was perilous, at least he started out with a full
belly and had drunk his fill of water. He was small and should be able to
hide fairly easily. His blond hair was a definite problem. It would stand
out against the green of the vegetation. Maybe he could plaster mud on his
hair later or weave a cap of leaves. No help for it now though. He hoped
for rain. That would help conceal him and wash out any tracks Jean was
leaving. His pursuers were too close for him to try to disguise his tracks.
Unexpectedly he came across a small river, swift flowing from where it
drained the low mountains to the north. The water was rough, with eddies
and whirlpools and rapids, but he had to chance it. Better to drown than to
be killed by their spears. Even worse was to be taken alive. The warriors
would not kill him right away. He could expect rape and torture before they
cut his head off. He plunged in, relying on his skills as a swimmer. Even
for someone as good in the water as Jean it was a close thing, but he made
it across then set off into the jungle, walking for a bit while his got
back his strength. Behind him he heard a shout of frustrated rage. The
warriors had found where he had swum across.
The big warrior wanted to try crossing the river, but it was too swift and
too deep to ford. One of the men lost his footing and disappeared below the
surface of the water. They caught a glimpse of his corpse floating
downstream but did not give chase. All the remaining warriors backed out of
the water, jabbering excitedly until one of them reminded them of the log
bridge several kilometers upstream. So they trooped off in that direction,
not even running. They would have to try to pick up Jean's trail on the
other side. Well, maybe they were not swimmers, but they were experienced
trackers and hunters. They would soon sniff out the young white man who had
temporarily shaken them off their trail.
Meanwhile Jean tried to turn his temporary advantage into a permanent
one. He realized the warriors would cast about for his trail and come after
him. He ran along a sloping rock bed to conceal his tracks, left
impressions in the soft ground just beyond, then stepped back through his
own footprints onto the rock. He left in a different direction entirely,
swinging on some overhanging branches to a dry spot where he would not
leave footprints. His grandfather had taught his something of tracking even
though Jean himself did not care much for blood sports.
Finally he got far enough ahead to lay a trap. It was simple enough,
footprints leading into a pit of quicksand, hastily concealed by reeds
stuck along the edge. He could not hope to trap the entire party, strung
out as they were, but he might get the lead runner, as indeed happened. His
pursuers were two down as he could see from a vantage point just below the
skyline in the distance. Now there were only three warriors plus the giant.
If only Jean could get a weapon. Being naked as a fugitive was no fun at
all. He had always liked running around naked, sleeping in the raw,
swimming and frolicking with a boyfriend without clothing. Now he knew what
that old phrase about girding one's loins meant. He felt so vulnerable
without clothing, so utterly naked! It was entirely psychological, he
realized, but no less real for that. Besides his feet hurt, and that was
real. He simply ignored the cuts and welts on his hide as he forced his way
through the forest. Insects buzzed around annoyingly. Maybe they didn't
bite or sting him so often as other folk, but he was hardly immune. So far
so good on finding clean water to drink. He might find himself hungry
tomorrow, but food could wait. He needed distance. No more laying
traps. That last one had made his enemies cautious. Time now for speed.
The night found Jean up in a tree hoping he did not have to share it with a
leopard or a tree snake. All he had with him was a stick he had picked
up. It was a stout cudgel but that was all. Tomorrow he would strike out
for German Kamerun, hoping to get away completely. During the night he
dreamed of Henri. At first it was a dream of their love together but it
soon turned tragic. He woke up with tears in his eyes. He vowed he would
survive, if only to see justice done.
The next day Jean woke up sore and hungry. His body was still tired though
he was wide awake. His feet were cut up and bruised; he had cuts and welts
from bamboo thorns and brush. His back ached from where he had cradled
himself between two close branches of the tree. He dropped to the ground
then set off walking, slowly at first till he worked out the worst of the
stiffness. The he fell into a ground covering routine of alternately
trotting then walking a half kilometer at a time. He hoped he had thrown
off his pursuers, but a recon from the top of a ridge showed two men were
still after him: the giant and one other. Good. At least he had made them
split their forces, uncertain whether he had continued east or had doubled
back to the west, as indeed he had. Two to one and both armed were not good
odds.
By the afternoon of the third day, Jean was ravenous. All the running had
burned up his energy stores, not that he could pack away much in the way of
reserves on his slight frame. He needed food, and not just the few grubs he
had found under logs and such. Maloto had claimed they were
delicacies. Well, the French ate snails and frogs legs, so who was he to
complain. Still he wished he had paid more attention to Maloto's
explanation of edible roots and fruits. The natives had a practical wisdom
about their land, one he wished had had availed himself of more than he
had. One thing he did remember is that many plants were poisonous. Plants
were at perpetual war with insects and herbivores, and toxins were their
weapons of choice. Even the humble domestic tomato plant was poisonous in
every single part except its fruit. (Tomatos really are fruits, botanically
a true berry.) He could not risk slipping into a village to look for food,
even if he came across one. Villages held warriors and dogs.
He stumbled across a dead antelope that buzzards and jackals fed off, but
its flesh was too putrid to risk. Better hungry than sick. He did manage to
club a catfish to death as it crawled on land between ponds. He ate it raw,
with no way to light a fire, which he could not have risked anyway. That
would have to sustain him. He realized he must be close to the border now
with German ruled lands. Of course, that was just a line on a map. There
wouldn't be a border post. There were no roads to Kamerun or through it,
for that matter, west to the lands of the British owned Royal Niger
Company. Each colonial power built its roads and its very few railroads to
its own coastal ports.
Jean realized he must be quite a sight: a small blond youth, pretty as a
girl, naked, sweaty, battered and bruised, slapping at bugs, tramping
barefoot and bareass across the African countryside, fleeing like a hunted
animal. Now he knew how the big game he occasionally hunted felt. Like them
he was looking for some way to shake off pursuit, forcing himself to keep
going when his body cried out for rest, ignoring hurts that would otherwise
seem incapacitating. If he survived, he did not think he would ever again
hunt purely for sport.
On the fourth day he heard a shout behind him. It was the other warrior,
not the giant, racing forward to catch Jean and engage him till his ally
could run up to them. Jean had discarded his cudgel for speed. It was just
a small naked youth against a strong and armed warrior. Jean's only
advantages were speed, agility, and the savatte he had learned several
years earlier and still practiced regularly. A small man sometimes needs an
equalizer. Jean got lucky. The warrior ran right at him instead of simply
trailing closer till he had caught his breath. Jean dodged the first spear
thrust, made clumsy by the warrior's fatigue, and got in close enough to
kick him hard in the groin and then in the belly. He snatched the spear
from the warrior's grasp and clouted the man in the head with the butt of
the spear. This was not from any sense of mercy, just the quickest way to
put him out of action as the giant lumbered into the fray.
Suddenly a warning shot rang out and Jean looked around to see a German
officer leading a platoon of shikari (native soldiers) march up to
them. The German pointed to the African warrior ready to give the order to
shoot, but Jean forestalled him.
"Nein," he said in his schoolboy German. "Er is fuer mich." No, he is
mine. With a nod the German acknowledged Jean's claim and stood back for
the final combat.
The giant warrior was confidant he could kill the boy, no matter what
happened afterwards. He was far stronger and more experienced with a
spear. It was true that the cuts Henri had inflicted on him had festered,
untended, poisoning his system, but he had every reason to expect a
victory.
Unfortunately for him, his smaller opponent did not use his captured weapon
as he expected. He used it like a quarter staff. The huge warrior had no
good counter to such tactics. A man with a stout staff is a match for a man
with a spear or a sword any day, at least defensively. Jean soon rang blows
and shallow cuts off the giant's knees, arms, and ribs, before driving the
butt of the spear into his throat crushing the windpipe. The man fell to
the ground mortally wounded. Jean plunged his spear into the man's belly to
let him feel the hurts he had inflicted on his lover only days before.
As the man died, Jean turned to the German officer, a Leutnant Krueger, to
explain what he, a French civil servant, was doing in German territory
stark naked and running from native warriors. The shikaris took the
unconscious warrior prisoner. Under questioning he confirmed Jean's amazing
story.
The German officer did not know which was more admirable. The young man's
courageous conduct or his extraordinary beauty. Even battered and bruised
he was lovely, slender yet muscular, tanned, taut and toned with narrow
shoulders, washboard abdominal muscles, well defined Adam's girdle, and
narrow hips. His hands were small and his legs slender with veins prominent
under the skin because of his low body fat. No hair interrupted the flow of
its faultless lines. Cock and balls were reasonably large but nothing
really, compared to the endowments of the natives, something that had
always chagrined the twenty-five year old German.
The young Frenchman had said he was nineteen, but could pass for two years
younger, naked and hairless as he was. The boy had one of those faces that
literally turned heads. Fine features, high cheekbones, straight nose, his
eyes limpid pools of green. Krueger hoped they could spend some time
together. His own fiancee was so far away in Danzig, and this French boy
was so very pretty and so very close and so very naked.
Well first things first. Duty required that he extend every hospitality to
a fellow European in distress. The boy had collapsed from complete
exhaustion after his battle with the giant, everything finally catching up
with him. Even so, he looked like an angel, as his unconscious body lay in
the litter his men made to carry him back to camp. His muscles must be
sore. Yes, Krueger would offer the lad a massage once they got him back to
camp and cleaned up and rested. As so it went, though Jean was polite in
refusing the officer's subtle advances. It was much to soon to think of
another man, only days after losing Henri.
Chapter 5. France
Months later, Grandfather Thibault with Jean's mother Marie at his side
looked on as his grandson, in his best Colonial Service uniform, received a
decoration for valor in a formal ceremony at the Colonial Ministry building
in Paris. Maybe Jean was not a soldier, but he had carried out his duty
courageously. Jean's story was in all the papers, adding yet another proud
chapter to the family legend. Jean's account of his adventures had given
credit to Henri for a brave death and his personal thanks for wounding the
native giant enough to give Jean a chance to defeat him in personal combat.
The general was also proud of the way Jean had played peacemaker in Africa
once the rebellion was put down. The natives really had no answer to the
Maxim gun or mortars, so resistance collapsed quickly. His superior
Malherbe had lost his nerve and fled the country entirely, so Jean was
briefly the ministry's senior man on the scene. At Jean's insistance, Chief
Kalundi was pardoned and coopted into the newly reformed governmental
structure. The chief's wisdom helped heal the wounds that war had inflicted
on his land. Nkobo had died in the last battle, throwing himself on French
bayonets rather than surrender.
Yet Jean still hadn't settled down. Recently he had taken up with that
artist fellow. Not the General's sort really, but it was Jean's life to
live, after all, so he had made his peace with the man. Paul DesRoches was
a water colorist and sketch artist, and illustrator, some half dozen years
older, tall and well built. He was brought in originally to illustrate
Jean's forthcoming book about his adventures. Soon he stayed over for the
night, then opened up a studio in the chateau. From the start the young men
had adjoining rooms. Within two weeks they stopped pretending they did not
share a bed.
Except for a rendering of the awards ceremony, all the illustrations would
be of Jean nude, 'drawn from life', as the phrase went, to titillate the
public with views of the lovely French youth without a stitch on. Even the
frontispiece would show the boy bare from head to hips. Paul had indicated
that his model would be completely nude for the sitting. A bit scandalous,
but beauty such as Jean's should be preserved from the ravages of time. The
general would get the actual portrait to hang in his den. In time it would
grace a museum.
Paul had Jean model for the actions he wanted to capture for the book. The
boy ran across remote sections of the grounds entirely naked, climbed
trees, swam, sparred with a big stableman who played the giant warrior, or
craftily laid his quicksand trap. That was one of the most scandalous of
the illustrations. It showed Jean from behind, bending over, presenting his
taut buns and cleavage to the reader, and there in the shadows between his
legs a suggestion of male genitalia with a hint of an orifice just
above. The general had to admit the artist had a way with the male
nude. You could see the tension in the legs of the runner or the muscle
bundles of the forearm stand out as Jean gripped the spear like a
quarterstaff or the sweat rolling down a bare chest and belly.
Jean was actually shown twice in one illustration. He modeled Henri in his
fight with the giant, with Henri's face drawn from a photograph. In the
background stood a trussed up Jean, looking on anxiously, in one of only
three illustrations with full frontal nudity.
Jean had asked for his grandfather's help in writing his story. The old man
was famous for the cogency of his orders in the field and his after action
reports. Instead of giving the lad detailed advice, he simply gave him a
copy of U.S. Grant's memoirs, in English. They both were fluent in that
language.
"Try to write as well as Grant did in his memoirs, and you will be
fine. Imagine Grant writing his chapters in French. Then do likewise."
One day the general walked in on them unexpectedly in the studio DesRoches
had set up at the chateau. He found Jean strung up by the wrists with Paul
working him over with a light whip.
"What are you doing to my grandson?" the general demanded in a firm tone.
Jean was surprised and embarrassed and hurriedly assured his grandfather
that nothing was amiss.
DesRoches quickly added. "I was just getting him ready for his next pose as
a whipped boy. The welts are for verisimilitude. I am doing nothing to Jean
that he doesn't want done to him."
Jean confirmed his claim.
"See, grandfather, I wasn't really bound at all," he said holding up the
loose length of rope. It's just a pose.
"I see," the old man said. "Very well, but don't show your mother the
finished picture, that is all I ask of you."
"Agreed."
"And Jean, I don't remember a whipping in the story of your capture and
escape. So?"
Jean colored, a full body blush, as he stammered something about a second
folio of drawings, perhaps for a work of fiction that might follow his
chronicle. Indeed, there had been some talk of such, but that was not the
real reason for the drawings or the light whipping.
"I see... Very well. Just make sure you lock the door to your studio from
now on, DesRoches."
"My fault, grandfather," Jean admitted.
"In that case, better give him another few licks as a reminder." the
general said, departing with a nod to DesRoches.
"I assure you sir, I shall give due attention to the boy's rump."
That drew a harrumph and a chuckle from the old man. Second folio indeed.
Erotic drawings for their own delectation was more like it.
A few days later, the old general was riding and came upon the two young
men in an isolated corner of the estate. Jean was posing and Pierre was
sketching him. Both were in the nude, bodies wet from a swim in the creek.
They made courtly and ironic bows to the old man who rode away smiling.
Well, they made a lovely couple, and Jean needed someone a bit older in his
life anyway. He hoped the older man realized that their relationship
required discretion. Look what happened to the poets Verlaine and young
Rimbaud after the took up with each other. An international scandal. Both
had come to bad ends.
For his part, Jean knew that he would always remember Henri and what they
had shared in Africa, but life was for the living and for now he would
share his with Paul. In the end, they spent forty years together. As an old
man, Paul died heroically, supporting the maquis fighting the Germans on
the plateau of Vercors in the summer of 1944.
Epilogue
Peace returned to the land where Jean had served. There was little fighting
in the First World War which ended with German Kamerun split between the
French and British. There was no fighting in the Second World War when the
colonial governments mostly declared for the Free French. In time, nearly
seven decades after Jean's time in Africa, in 1960, the French colonies
were set free to decide their own destiny. One of the leaders of the
peaceful movement for independence was Kalundi's great grandson. Jean
Thibault lived to see it too, still vigorous in his eighties at the family
chateau. Africa's sons would now rule their own lands, for better or for
worse. And so it has been even to this day.